COMPOSERS: Tchaikovsky
LABELS: DG Galleria
WORKS: Capriccio Italien; Francesca da Rimini; Romeo and Juliet; 1812 Overture
PERFORMER: Israel PO/Leonard Bernstein
CATALOGUE NO: 439 983-2 ADD/DDD (1979/85)
Bernstein is at his finest in magnetic accounts of the doom-laden Francesca fantasy (after Canto V of Dante’s Inferno), and the inescapably tragic Romeo and Juliet fantasy overture; both are viscerally exciting, super-charged performances drawn from 1979 analogue sources, now remastered and scarcely inferior to the digital offerings here. The Capriccio Italien and 1812 are delivered with swaggering virtuosity and panache; cannon salvoes, bells and processional brass approach overkill, but with Lenny before a live audience anything could happen, and often did! Michael Jameson
Tchaikovsky: Capriccio Italien; Francesca da Rimini; Romeo and Juliet; 1812 Overture
Bernstein is at his finest in magnetic accounts of the doom-laden Francesca fantasy (after Canto V of Dante’s Inferno), and the inescapably tragic Romeo and Juliet fantasy overture; both are viscerally exciting, super-charged performances drawn from 1979 analogue sources, now remastered and scarcely inferior to the digital offerings here. The Capriccio Italien and 1812 are delivered with swaggering virtuosity and panache; cannon salvoes, bells and processional brass approach overkill, but with Lenny before a live audience anything could happen, and often did! Michael Jameson
Our rating
4
Published: January 20, 2012 at 2:32 pm